Subscribe
Share
Share
Embed
The only podcast covering all things Arizona State athletics! We bleed maroon and gold, and love talking about the Sun Devils no matter what sport.
Tom Hardon (00:01)
Welcome one, welcome all to another episode of Echo from the Buttes. I'm your host Tom Harden standing in for David Hellman once again. With me I have Andrew Hazlett and Austin Bundy and two and Owen Big 12 play for the Sun Devils. It is an absolutely great feeling. a TCU team, came in number 24 in the nation. And I want to open up this show with a public apology to
our secondary. All of us have been vocal skeptics about how the secondary is going to hold up with all the injuries and going up against very potent passing offenses. And they have more than just held their ground. They have they've impressed me. I was looking through stats and I saw for the Texas State game, enter the game with 530 yards of total offense held them to 303 yards.
Andrew Hayslett (00:42)
Thank you.
Tom Hardon (01:01)
at Baylor entered with 517 yards per game. We held them to 357. TCU on Friday entered with 516 yards per game, held them to 269, beat them at their own game. This defense is holding these teams at least 150 yards below their per game average and doing it with a lot of pieces missing in the secondary. So I, for one, am
Just absolutely impressed and want to see these guys keep going like this. Awesome. We'll start with you. What's your takeaway from that?
Austen Bundy (01:37)
I mean, you just think about it? Imagine when these guys are fully healthy, how much better this defense is going to be ⁓ and all the different packages and all the different. ⁓
Andrew Hayslett (01:42)
Thank you.
Austen Bundy (01:47)
different personnel can you can throw out there especially if you want to confuse offenses ⁓ these backups of the one these guys who are coming in second stringers ⁓ guys not with the next man up mentality or showing out the way they are right now just imagine when they're fully healthy and they're expecting one set of ⁓ defensive looks at the at a completely different one and and they're all holding up at the same time i mean it's like you said very impressive and it's very heartening moving forward into the rest of the big twelve slate
Andrew Hayslett (02:18)
Yeah, the defense is really impressive now. Like you said, Austin, this team's gonna be really deep. This team's too deep is just, I think, pretty good. We saw, what was it, 13 tackles for loss last game. Held TCU to only 12 rushing yards total for the whole game. I can count that on all my fingers and toes, which is... If I can say that about any... If you're holding a team rushing or passing that, that means you did a pretty good job.
I would say. I don't know. But at the end of day, the defense stood out in a big way. Got a lot of playmakers, especially the Prince Dorber sack and I'll take your Christmas gift from you. Fumble and recovery then.
Tom Hardon (03:12)
And also, you brought it up pre show how a lot of the credit also goes to the defensive fronts. And I'm in full agreement with you there. Six sacks of Josh Hoover, 13 tackles per loss. They held the TCU rushing attack to under 20 yards net for the game. Granted TCU's rushing attack wasn't the best that we were going to face. And that's something that we talked about in our previous show on Friday.
Anytime you're holding a team under 50 yards rushing collectively is a major accomplishment.
Austen Bundy (03:49)
Yeah, absolutely. mean, the fact that they had that clutch strip sack at the end there of Hoover, easily one of the biggest plays of the season right there. I mean, there was a second where I thought, OK, we're about to get reverse Baylor here. They're going to go down the field and kick a game-tying, game-winning field goal or something. And it would just be our luck back-to-back weeks to have that happen against us.
But for the defense to step up the way they did, for them to be able to get to the quarterback as many times as they did, frustrate that offense and cause a lot of mistakes, ⁓ huge credit to them. And I'm just excited to see how much more they can really pressure some of these high powered offenses that ASU is gonna go up against as they continue their title defense.
Andrew Hayslett (04:36)
I'm looking forward to seeing what this defense can do against all those offenses like you said. The one time I want to see them face is Texas Tech that we'll see here what two three weeks.
I think they go to Utah after the buy and then face Tech at home, which we'll know more about these teams further down the road obviously with more games to play. A lot is going to be changing in my big 12th power rankings that I'm going to write on Devils in detail that this podcast is associated with. But you can check all of our work out there. I'm probably going to plug that, but yeah.
Austen Bundy (04:52)
Okay.
Andrew Hayslett (05:15)
lot of interesting things happening within the Big 12. Texas Tech obviously not playing, I believe last weekend if memory serves me correctly. But yeah, just a lot of say, this team, we know now like a lot about Iowa State now is yes, they're good. Arizona, even though they started off 3-0.
said, oh, maybe they can be good, the way they just looked out came against Iowa State and said, yeah, this team is average or so, which is obviously an improvement from what they were last year, but they still are improved, which, have it to go so.
I just want to mention them. Among other teams, UCF, was a team that I thought, oh, they're going into Kansas, they should win that game, or Kansas State rather, they should win that game. No, just kind of shows how the Big 12 just is versatile, volatile is the right word, and things can happen.
any given week. No really weeks off in this conference. I think we'll see that kind of play down further down the road past those Texas Tech, Utah, Houston games into those ones that Arizona State's going to take on your West Virginia and Arizona and Colorado, et cetera.
Tom Hardon (06:43)
And looking at the Big 12 as a whole, this is Arizona State's eighth straight win against Big 12 opponents. And we have our best conference start since 2012. How are you guys feeling now about that title defense compared to where we were feeling on Friday? We were a little bit cautious. Some of us were more cautious. Some of us were more optimistic. Hi, that's me. I'm the optimistic one.
But where do you guys see us now in terms of that title defense after Friday's win?
Austen Bundy (07:17)
you some people are not to be happy with me but still in the same spot talking after the texas tech game and then we'll start getting ⁓ serious about it ⁓ you've got a by week this week that hopefully kenny's gonna help coach up some guys like as you can get healthier we should go to the utah game and hopefully take care of business there on still a little iffy about that they could be another time tracking type ⁓ just given how
Utah is just inevitable when it comes to college football. Last year was the exception, I believe, ⁓ because of injuries and just, I mean, there's only so much that Kyle Whittingham can do. But he's got a healthy roster. He's got a much improved roster, I believe. ⁓
I think that's going to be a much tougher game than people are going to realize. And then if you do come away with that victory, Texas Tech at home, it's going to be the same thing as we just saw in this TCU game, except it's going to be on a Saturday. ⁓ If ASU gets those two wins, I believe they are destined to go back to the championship game.
Andrew Hayslett (08:21)
Yeah, I agree. Just got to get those two big, bigger teams, I would tend to say. But yeah, gotta rattle off. You can't just say, this team's a guaranteed shot to make the big 12 championship game. No, there's still a lot of football left to be played. Two games are all me.
what not even a third big 12 playing yet so like I said it's a long way to go I know Utah's like Arizona State on a bye week this week so let's kind of just say ⁓
Arizona State really doesn't have an advantage of having the bye week because Utah also has that going for them. Or if you want to call it a disadvantage, same thing. It really doesn't matter that they have the bye week this week because Utah has as well. Just something to look out for. Utah is always a good team. Last year, they weren't, but they've got a lot of different faces there in the offensive coordinator, new quarterback.
There's so much else different with that team as well. You can't say, ⁓ this is the, it wasn't really any team pretty much. This is the same team year after year because no guys leave and get old or transfer or aren't good or they bring other people in, freshmen transfers in just so much volatility in teams year to year. can't say, ⁓ this is going to be the
same
team. Well it is to an extent, but it's not really. There's so much to change. Continuity is not the word of the college football anymore.
Austen Bundy (10:14)
I love how Andrew says they're good when you guys getting old. 22, 23 is now considered getting old, so thanks for that.
Andrew Hayslett (10:21)
mean, for college football. There's old
for life, which is, think, I think the three of us here, I would still consider young.
Tom Hardon (10:31)
Thank you. As a 35-year-old, I appreciate those comments. I do want to talk about the bye week coming up. In the post-game comments, Coach Dillingham was very candid when asked about the upcoming bye week, saying, I am so fired up for this bye week. And I think that this comes at a very deserved time, gives the team time to just get some rest, get guys healthy again, hopefully.
Hopefully have Montana Warren back for the Utah game. I'm sure about Xavier and Alford, given that it's been said that's a multi-week injury. hopefully get them at least on the right path. But do you guys think that this is a good time for us to be having the bye? Or do we have the momentum? And might that momentum be hindered with the bye coming up?
Austen Bundy (11:24)
to a degree, believe momentum is a big part of this, but this is where Kenny's gonna have to prove that coaching and rest are gonna be more valuable to this team. ⁓ I think they're gonna be okay. I mean, if you were gonna be exiting the bi-week going up against Texas Tech, then I think you might be talking about a problem. ⁓ Just because you're going into a really high-powered...
really high-powered opponent even though you're at home. ⁓ Going on the road to Utah is not easy either but I do believe that it's a little bit more manageable than if you were to have to jump start yourself again against the toughest Big 12 opponent you're going to be facing all year. ⁓
I think buys around this time, because this is a week six buy I believe that we're getting, and it's a roughly half-ish way into the season, a little before. I think it's a good sweet spot to have it, because you've already established yourself in conference play. You're allowing guys who got banged up earlier in the season to rest up a little bit. You can coach away some of those mistakes, some of those habits that you started to see earlier in the season.
So I believe that this is the right spot to have a buy for us. ⁓ I don't think...
it's going to be as detrimental as a lot of people like to make it out to be. think the only way this is going to be detrimental is in the eyes of the AP voters just because we are sitting at number 25 again. We got ourselves back into the rankings. But you could easily make the case that AP voters are going to drop ASU out of the top 25 if there is no movement in the four teams ahead of us, which I believe it's UVA, BYU. I don't.
ahead of them and then Notre Dame. But if any of those teams hold on to their spot or hold on to their spots and wins and then somebody in the previous group with ⁓ that's receiving votes like an Auburn or ⁓ South Florida or someone like that happens to pull off an upset or beats a higher ranked team that's where you could see ASU lose its spot just because they were on a buy that week.
Tom Hardon (13:42)
While we wait for Andrew to come back and join us, looks like he's having a little bit of technical difficulties. I'll run through those teams that are immediately ahead of Arizona State in the top 25. Starting with number 21, we have a 2-2 Notre Dame. At 22, a 4-1 Illinois. At number 23, an undefeated BYU at 4-0. And then 24, a 4-1 UVA.
Others receiving votes. have that group of five lurker in South Florida, right outside the top 25. They received 53 points in the voting, and Utah is right there at 52. I think I'm in agreement with you. We do need to see some movement in the teams immediately ahead of us, or even a little bit more. I could even take a little more chaos in up to, say, up to number 16. If any of those teams get
Completely embarrassed that should certainly drop them out and at least keep us out of net even Depending on how teams right below us in the also receiving votes category do But it you know 25 isn't it's realistically right where I thought we would be Plugging on plugging our upcoming more important Devils in Detail top 25. I had us ranked a little bit higher Give us a little bit of a buffer. I won't completely completely spoil the
the rankings of where I had us, but it's very much in tune with where I thought that we would be.
Austen Bundy (15:15)
Yeah, I thought we were gonna just swap places with TCU to be honest with you, just because, I mean, it just felt like a natural spot. I didn't think they would drop us right into the, at the very end of those rankings there. I noticed there were, I mean, I noticed a couple other voters who had released their ballots had us up as high as like 21 at some point for this incoming week, which I thought, sure, I'll take it. But 25, sure, fair.
I think I would have preferred a 24 or 23 given that you saw so much more movement between teams higher up in the rankings. I Ole Miss beat LSU and jumped up like 10 spots.
Tom Hardon (15:54)
They
basically swapped spots. LSE was four and Ole Miss was 13 going into that game. They swapped according to the AP voters.
Austen Bundy (16:02)
Yeah, they basically swapped them. Same thing with like Penn State and Oregon. Oregon jumped all the way to two, but they beat the number three team in the nation in Penn State, now Penn State's down to seven, where Oregon was six going in. ⁓
I think as we've noticed, mean, four teams in the top eight this Saturday lost. So I think it's safe to say that there will be some sort of movement, that there will be some ranked teams that are gonna lose week to week. I think, like you said, for our preferences, it's gotta be on the lower half of the table. If it's any higher, then it still runs the risk of anybody who's in that getting votes category that could jump us just because we have a bye week.
Tom Hardon (16:44)
As we're looking ⁓ at the upcoming top 25 for ⁓ those teams that are right around us, Illinois plays at Purdue this week, and Virginia plays at Louisville. And looking down the rest of the way, you have Florida State and Miami. I don't think that's going to be much of a needle mover unless Miami drops a 60-burger on Florida State. ⁓
So we really need, and we'll be keenly looking at those first few games that I mentioned. Also have Boise State at Notre Dame. Now Boise State presents an interesting case because they were darlings in the top 25 at the start of the year, got off to a slow start. Boise State could have the opportunity to come in and play a little bit of spoiler in South Bend after their loan loss of the season at South Florida to open.
Austen Bundy (17:37)
Louisville, Virginia, that's going to be the one to watch next week, I think, if you're an ACC fan, because Louisville's undefeated right now. If they take down Virginia, they'll be 5-0 and likely to either completely swap with UVA 24 or even get a little bit of a higher spot there. I think that's going to be a really interesting one. I if you're an ASU fan, you're rooting for Louisville there in order to bump UVA down a little bit. ⁓
But I don't think that's going to be any detriment to ASU's spot just at sitting at 25. But who knows? I mean, if Louisville were to really thrash UVA, they could move them up a couple spots. That gives ASU a little bit of an opportunity to maybe jump up to 24 if the voters are generous. But as we've learned before, being Sun Devil fans, the AP voters are never generous with ASU. They are almost always harsh.
Tom Hardon (18:28)
Yeah, it's a tricky spot to be in, I think for my part, being ranked going into the bye week, I will take it. Even if we drop down to the first or second outside the top 25, I think we're still in good position to be able to get back in there with, ⁓ depending on the results at Utah. I want to go back to some of the comments from after the game and.
With Jesus Gomez missing two field goals earlier in the game from over 40 yards, you could say that the weather was a little bit of a factor. It did pour heavily pregame and it was very humid. ⁓ It wasn't the typical September weather that we are used to having here in Tempe, but.
Coach Dillingham had very glowing words about Hazus in his posting comments. Absolutely zero doubt ever he was going to make the kick with the game on the line, talking about the field goal to win it. And Kenny later went on to add that if the kick was from 56 yards with the game on the line, he still would have no doubt that Hazus would be able to convert it. What does that say to you about how
Kenny feels with this team.
Austen Bundy (19:47)
I'm right off the bat. feel like it's a complete 180 where he was standing last season when he was ready to go to the student body for kicker tryouts I mean, I would rather Kenny have confidence in a kicker even if he's
feigning it by 10 % just to avoid that storyline all over again. But I mean, I give Jesus a lot of credit just because the angles where he missed those two field goals were a lot tougher than I think a lot of people give him credit for. I mean, especially being a lefty, like it's not easy going in there and have it to kick lefty on certain hash marks or certain sides of the hash marks where he got trapped a little bit on those first two. I mean, I think the announcer said that ⁓
as soon as he shanks the first one he was going to pull the second one automatically using a golf metaphor that if you shank your first one you're automatically going to be pulling your other one to the right.
Tom Hardon (20:42)
That's Andrew. We're talking about the confidence that that coach Dillingham is showing in Jesus despite missing two field goals and having complete trust in him with the game on the line. What does that say to you about how Kenny views this team?
Andrew Hayslett (20:56)
A different one from last year, that's for sure, because even though Jesus missed a few vehicles there, one of those was ⁓ from the left hash.
with wind that was really funky. He was kicking toward the student section where I was and one of them was on that kick the flags on the goalpost were going one way and the flags on the other end of the stadium the American flag, ASU flag and so on were going a completely different way just a lot of the wind in the stadium was swirling at that point. I'm not quite sure exactly what happened on this miss kick.
guys probably know more than I do but I think the confidence is good. Jesus has shown in the past why he's a good kicker at Eastern Michigan in the first few games here. ⁓ No matter where you are you're gonna have some out of character misses. I don't care if you're Brandon Aubrey or Jesus Gomez or Karsten Kiefer.
you're gonna miss vehicles that you should make. It happens.
Tom Hardon (22:07)
And
the misses that he had were not easy kicks, even in perfect conditions. 46 and 43 yards, those are pokes for a lot of college kickers. I'm in a full agreement with you guys. It's a complete opposite from where we were standing last year. Austin, you brought up point of having open tryouts for students for kicking to replace Ian Hershey. And I know it's.
It just speaks to me that, you Kenny is a true players coach. He's got his players backs 100 % unless, you know, unless you give them unless you give him an excuse to not be in your corner.
Andrew Hayslett (22:53)
I think even still with that, I don't even think they had open tryout kicks. I think they had a few students come on, but it wasn't open to anyone. I don't think I could have gotten on that even if I wanted to.
Austen Bundy (23:11)
Yeah, I mean it was purely
a motivational thing. I don't think he was really going to select a kicker from whoever they brought in to try out. I think that was just to get under the skin of the kickers that they had on the roster and kind of motivate them to do better.
Andrew Hayslett (23:24)
Yeah.
Tom Hardon (23:25)
Yeah, I think I agree with you. think it was really ⁓ just a light of fire under the guise. But Andrew, you were in the crowd this time. And one of my favorite comments from Kenny was about creating a demand and people wanted to be at the game. he had a comment of, hypothetically, people are going to start saying,
Andrew Hayslett (23:29)
Thank
Tom Hardon (23:53)
If you're not at the football game, then where are you? The expectation of ASU is playing on a Friday or a Saturday, and that's the place to be in Tempe. Did you feel that buzz in the stadium as you were walking around?
Austen Bundy (23:57)
mill
Andrew Hayslett (24:07)
Yeah, when I got there...
I think it was an oversell to standing room only. It's like these people are actually standing versus, you know, finding an empty seat somewhere to sit in. So yeah, I think the student section has a whole stayed out, stayed there throughout the whole game versus even, even normally when the games are close, they still like to leave it half. I don't think many did as compared to the usual. So yeah, it felt to me like it was,
the best student section I've ever been in but
How much of was that the game? How much of was that the rankness? How much was that being a bit earlier? I don't know, I think. A lot of it's all part of that, which is good to see regardless. With the next home game being Texas Tech, obviously I think that's gonna get a huge draw. And then Houston.
and we won't get as big of a draw as what we saw against TCU and certainly not West Virginia but we'll see how that game is in particular because if they can still sell out West Virginia game number six at home which that means you'd probably have to sell out the next two games as well you're looking at a very very very very good student section in terms of turnout and everything else
which you'll have to see. And then if you sell out West Virginia and all those before, you're going to sell out the Territorial Cup too. So there's a good chance that the student section sell out every time, which would be, I think, huge for Dillingham and the rest of the football people, from the team to staff to athletic department. It would be really cool to see if they could do that.
you
Tom Hardon (26:12)
And even looking
ahead to the Territorial Cup, we have an announced start time of 7 p.m. on that Thanksgiving Friday. It's going to be a crowded day in Tempe for athletics. I'll be double heading going from hockey to football. Tempe is definitely going to be the place to be on Thanksgiving Friday. Forget going Black Friday shopping. This is the true Black Friday.
Andrew Hayslett (26:35)
Forget that random NFL game on Prime on Black Friday 2, who cares?
Tom Hardon (26:40)
Doesn't
get relegated to prime anyway, nobody cares about that.
Austen Bundy (26:43)
Is that a 7 p.m. local kickoff or ⁓ Man, I gotta stay up till 10 o'clock on that Friday. All right. I'll do it. I'll take one for the team
Tom Hardon (26:46)
7pm local, yes.
Darn, what a shame.
Andrew Hayslett (26:56)
I I wish those games were a little bit earlier too, is when I'm... when I'm a fan or a covering. I preferred...
Austen Bundy (27:03)
They always used to be, they used to be like
⁓ three, four o'clock kickoffs local, I remember. Like for the longest time, that game was always a day game. I don't remember it ever being prime time except for maybe my sophomore year, it was a night game when it was down in Tucson. But that's the last time I remember it not being during the day. ⁓
Tom Hardon (27:21)
I'm
thinking of that same one. think 2016, was a 7 PM kick down in Tucson. My best friend and I drove down to Tucson for that game and I really, you know, that's a very forgettable game otherwise. yeah, you know, even last year and the last few years have been 1 PM kicks. So I think being a 7 PM kick.
is going to drive the drive the urgency to be in the stadium for the game because you're not you know you're not going to be you're not going to be caught up with whoever does decide to go Black Friday shopping or whatever else is going on throughout the day like it sets ⁓ it sets a high standard of this is the event to be at and I for one really like that.
Andrew Hayslett (28:12)
to too.
Austen Bundy (28:13)
I feel like the one thing you're always competing with is who's going to Mill on a Friday night or something like that or who's going to Mill on a Saturday night. I mean, that's where Kenny's marketing comes in and convincing students like this is the place to be. Like Mill Avenue will always be there. the bars aren't closing much longer after the game ends. So they're trying to convince ⁓ students to go to the game and be like stick around until at least start of the fourth quarter, see where we're at and then you can leave.
Tom Hardon (28:42)
You can go to me at 11 o'clock, you still got three hours until last call.
Austen Bundy (28:45)
Yeah
Andrew Hayslett (28:46)
Real
Avenue is pretty much hopping 365 days a year. There's only seven Saturdays where ASU football is playing at Mountain America Stadium. supply and demand.
Tom Hardon (29:00)
I want to pivot back to the overall play of the team and back to Kenny's comments in postgame. He said, we're winning games and not playing our best football. I want to put that in perspective. Just imagine what this team would look like if we were firing at 100%. We didn't have the best performance against NAU. That's not a knock on NAU at all.
They are a top 20 total offense in FCS. We got our butts handed to us metaphorically on the road in Starkville. I think that's really a case of just the environment and not taking Mississippi State as seriously as the team should have been. But you've got three straight.
Austen Bundy (29:50)
They took
Tennessee to overtime too. I mean, I give them lot of credit. That loss looks a lot better now on ASU's resume.
Tom Hardon (29:57)
Hey, as long as Mississippi State keeps winning, then I'm okay with that because it turns into a quality loss for us. And I will take quality losses all day long. But we've had three straight games against the state of Texas and it seems like this team is gelling a little bit more and more each week. Do you guys get the same impression as I do?
Andrew Hayslett (30:22)
Yeah, absolutely. I felt like we saw the defense really...
this kind of a click week to an extent. They've still got some work to do, but I felt like the defense as a whole took a step out. Offense was good. Still need, for me, think the biggest takeaway on what they need to improve in particular is that red zone offense. Even from within the, extend that to a 30 yard line, is that they've kind of just been a little iffy with, I felt like they've
sometimes got gotten a little bit too cute with things with play calls. I don't know how you guys feel, but that's something I would I would see. overall, this is inspiring off of what feels like a eight out of 10 for me right now. They're they're clicking, but they're not fully clicking yet.
Austen Bundy (31:17)
Yeah, that's right. I mean, I think it was, I don't remember if it was their penultimate drive in the fourth quarter where they could not punch it in on all four downs. And I mean, I can't even say that they tried to punch it in because they threw, think, on all four downs and it didn't make any sense that they didn't run the ball more often because they were within the five yard line. Like it didn't make sense to try and fool TCU on any of these quick outrouts or button hooks that you're trying to throw some picks around. Like just hand it off to the
to the biggest running back and try and make a hole, like throw two tight ends in there to block, like it doesn't make any sense to try and throw the ball in those situations. You have Sam Levitt too who has some really strong legs, like if you want to tush push this thing, go ahead, like it didn't make any sense to me that...
Kenny was getting, like you said Andrew, starting to get a little cute on some of these play calls when some simple ground and pound football would have gotten them into the end zone. That being said, I mean, in the first half I thought when they were down 17-0, okay, this is going exactly like I thought it was gonna be when I was the pessimist in the predictions. ⁓ And then towards the end of the first half, the offense started to click a little bit more, they got 14 points and it looked like, they're starting to wake up a little bit.
And then the second half, were a completely different animal and looking more and more like the team that we saw at the Peach Bowl ⁓ last year. And like you guys have said, I mean, can we really just imagine what this team is going to look like if it's firing on all cylinders? Granted, I can't really remember any teams with high expectations in the last 10 years that started slow. And so many people were like,
just can't just wait until they start firing on all cylinders like they're still alive like they can really do this i don't remember any teams like that that have actually ended up firing on all cylinders when they needed to i mean i hope asu is the first one to do that but it feels like you kind of have to like if you got it you got it and you kind of have to have it right from the start and all the way through otherwise it just doesn't seem to be sustainable once you start figuring it out late in the season
Tom Hardon (33:20)
I for one am glad that the the game performance did not turn out to be exactly like you had predicted on Friday Nothing not gonna lie. I was as soon as we went down 17 nothing that creeping thought came in of Austin was right. What do we what do we do about this and then slowly? know slowly but surely chip by chip, you know, you're never gonna get 17 points back in one drive there. It's it's impossible, but this team showed me
Austen Bundy (33:36)
you
Tom Hardon (33:50)
real grit and real determination in just never giving up and making the plays that needed to be made at the right time. The red zone offense does still bother me. in Sam's post game comments, he took it on himself for some of the issues in the red zone, saying that he needs to go through his progression more and work through the back line on those past plays down deep.
How much of that do you think is accurate? How much of it do you think is completely on Sam? And how much of it do you think belongs on Marcus Arroyo and the calls going into Sam?
Andrew Hayslett (34:31)
I think Sam.
Whether it is his fault or isn't his fault is going to say it's his fault because that's the type of leader he is. He always wants to be the best and he's going to be one of those guys say, if something goes wrong, it's on me. Whether it is or isn't, I would say it's more on Marcus Arroyo and Kenny Dillingham, the play calling that they're drawing up there. For me, just, it's not doing it. But if it's not working, yeah, Sam does need to.
improve a little bit but I don't think that's the root of the problem. think it's more of a byproduct of the main issue.
Tom Hardon (35:12)
And for anybody within the football program who might happen to come across this, I want to go on record as saying, I am not saying this is all on Marcus Arroyo. I think that the play calling in large part is still great. It's just tweaks down the red zone. That's what I see.
Andrew Hayslett (35:30)
I agree too, like 95 % of it is clearly working, it's just the 5 % that's not. It just happens to be in a bad place, which I obviously know that they're doing their best that they can, better than I can do, that's for sure.
Tom Hardon (35:50)
Better than I can do
too.
Austen Bundy (35:52)
I feel like there's also a degree of a mix of poor execution and just great defense. Like give TCU a lot of credit for when they were like making good plays on a goal line stand. I mean, they got desperate. They were an animal backed against the wall and they did exactly what.
a team should do in that situation. So I feel like there's a little bit of credit that belongs to just a good going up against a good defense. mean, those play calls could have worked nine times out of 10, and we just happened to see the 10th time each time they called it.
Tom Hardon (36:23)
Absolutely, I agree with you there. And to the point about, you know, go and go with the ground and pound game. I don't think Relique Brown is quite that ground and pound running back down in the red zone. Again, no discredit to him. 22 carries for 147 yards. Fantastic game. Explosive runner in the open field. But I don't think the ground and pound game in the red zone is his, is the best fit for him. I think, you know, he's much better utilized as...
as a receiving back coming out of the backfield on those short passing plays.
Andrew Hayslett (36:54)
I think that's where you bring in Kyson and I don't think Tanya Udo got a single carry all game but that's where you bring in those bigger bulkier guys which Relief Brown isn't. That's just how he's built but try something different. think that could work. Even if you have to bring in an offensive lineman and give the ball to him. I'm like a...
Tom Hardon (37:20)
Now write them as a fallback.
Andrew Hayslett (37:22)
full back to something different. I think the Sun Devils are considering that could work for them. We'll see what they bring up against Utah on two Saturdays from now.
Tom Hardon (37:37)
And for the passing game, we've been saying for weeks and weeks, don't feed the ball 100 % through Tyson. But I think that this was a game that we needed to have the offense go through Tyson, through the air. And it worked out incredibly well. Eight catches for 126 yards in both touchdowns. That 57 yard receiving touchdown was a thing of beauty from my vantage point up top. I'm sure down in the crowd, everybody was going
going crazy, but I loved seeing that performance out of Tyson. It was the Jordan Tyson that we have been expecting all season long.
Austen Bundy (38:16)
Yeah, and I mean, they didn't force it to him. Like I said, if he was open, throw it to him. And he was hoping a lot. mean, they found like Sam found a lot of space for him to operate. And I think there was only a couple in completions where you could potentially find fault in throwing it to Tyson at that point. I think the only one that I think you can ever criticize anything for was when he went up for the one-handed catch in the end zone. I mean, I know the announcers were like, you got to go up with two hands and bring that down. I mean, in his position, he was never going to get both hands up high enough for the ball.
But that may have been a situation where Sam didn't necessarily need to try and find number zero there. He could have ran it himself or found a different option that was a blown up play. ⁓ But Tyson was open a vast majority of the time and Sam found him. I'm not going to fault him that forever going looking for zero and just saying screw it, zero's down there somewhere. Like he was and he found him.
Andrew Hayslett (39:13)
Yeah, that's for sure. also want to shout out Jaren Hamilton on his big play. Sun Devils has been trying to get him the ball. I feel like one or two targets every game had quite connected. But we saw that finally happen on Saturday and made that catch that I think was crucial and that guy that he wound up making that catch.
Tom Hardon (39:38)
That one catch for 44 yards, big play. And as I saw that unfold, my first thought was, welcome to the season, Jaren Hamilton. We've been waiting for you. But this was another great game where Sam spread the ball around really well. Tyson and Raleigh each had eight catches. Chamameteer, four catches for 25 yards, even keeping us happy at his involvement. Cam Harpole pulled in a couple catches.
Austen Bundy (39:47)
Thank
Tom Hardon (40:05)
and even had the return on the ⁓ short kick from TCU. I believe that came in the third quarter. And then one catch each from Hamilton, McLean, Eusebio. And Kamari Anderson had a catch, even though it went for a loss. still, Sam is spreading the ball around really well. 26 catches by his receiving core in total. I think his progression is starting to pick back up.
He is not going to be 100 % reliant on Tyson as he was early in the season. He's going to be a lot more comfortable spreading the ball around. And like he said, Austin, find Tyson. Absolutely go to him when he's open because he is your big playmaker. He's going to have those explosive carries.
Andrew Hayslett (40:52)
I think game reps are game reps too, is that you can only play the game and the game level at 12 times a year more if you're lucky with getting to the postseason. But you can only get those reps a year and those are so valuable and you improve so much from them. That's why I think we've seen Leva take the jump is that, he's getting reps, he's taking steps forward versus having six months
to that you don't get those game wraps. You're probably going to look a little bit stagnant to start and that's I think what happened.
Tom Hardon (41:31)
My last big point that I want to bring up for this episode is the impact of the blackout and Like him like Kenny did when he opened up his post game comments I want to give a big shout out to the ASU grounds crew The end zones were on point. It was very clean. Very simple it mimics the simplicity of the jerseys that the team wore on the field and
I'm of the opinion that when you're going into a blackout environment, that produces an intimidation factor for the opponent. What do you guys think about that?
Austen Bundy (42:11)
100%. I mean, it's all there's the look good, feel good, play good for the players, but also like for the environment that fans are going into and just the vibe in general. The field looked fantastic. mean, ASU has the best fields weekend and week out. Like there's like debate a wall. That grounds crew constantly has that place looking pristine. ⁓ I'm still of the opinion that the big Jumbotron was not worth getting rid of all of those big seats and making Sun Devil Stadium
a lot smaller than it used to be just 10 years ago. ⁓ But I think the Sun Devil fans when they show up and they're all coordinated and they're all loud and they're all participating in whatever color it is or whatever the theme is for that night, it plays into the team. The team knows that they've got something to play for, somebody to play for. They've got a community around them that is rallying and supporting them. it really like, it puts ASU closer to the level of
to get in the Big Ten and in the SEC. Those are Saturdays are religion, communities and environments and ASU has been trying for so long to get to that level and I think we're in a position now where if fan engagement is on the rise again and if ASU's play is consistent and continues to be as successful as we saw last season and carries over consistently.
Tempe is going to turn into one of those Saturdays as a holiday type of towns and you're going to start seeing more and more of the fans staying through the whole game. You're going to start seeing that the ASU fan base grow and the games being one of the hottest tickets in town. And I cannot wait for the day that ESPN comes on for a prime time game and puts us on a similar level to the type of environment you're going to get when you go to
the big house or you go to Ohio State or you go down to Tuscaloosa. I know we're never going to match them, but I think ASU is capable of at least mimicking that kind of environment.
Andrew Hayslett (44:19)
Yeah, I'd love to see a big noon kickoff or college game day come to Tempe. I don't remember the last time. Well, I don't remember it, but I know the last time was like 2007 when they played Notre Dame. If I'm not mistaken, right, that was a year. But game day did not come that one.
Austen Bundy (44:37)
Game day didn't come for that one.
No, I believe they've only been to Tempe once and I think it was like a 2005 or 2006 game against USC. That's the only time I remember them coming.
Tom Hardon (44:49)
I think that sounds about right when the Matt Leonard and Reggie Bush years.
Andrew Hayslett (44:49)
you
You're probably right on that. Memories... Memories of stuff happened when you were two is, You're not gonna remember that much. But, regardless... It's overdue. I...
Yeah, it's nice going to Alabama every year, but making skip a year of Alabama, right? We know what Alabama is. Let's give some of the other people a chance. That's kind of my thoughts on that, but I'm obviously not gonna say no.
Tom Hardon (45:22)
get some
features from Mill Avenue during the pregame show. That would be a sight to see for sure.
Andrew Hayslett (45:27)
Yeah.
Yeah, kind of going off what you said, talking about the ground screw, yeah, they did a great job. Had the tarp out there, which I didn't know they had a tarp for Mountain America Field. That's new to me. I had...
Tom Hardon (45:46)
It makes sense to me because you've got to be prepared in any contingency. I don't know where they keep it, but I'm glad that it was out there. I'm glad that the field was in as excellent shape as it was. And absolutely 100%, we do have the best grounds crew in the country week in and week out. And they outdid themselves this week. I only saw a couple.
Couple instances where players on each side slipped a little bit, but there really was no egregious issues on the field.
Andrew Hayslett (46:27)
Yeah, absolutely, definitely. know, going back to the tarp conversation, I do know Phoenix Municipal Stadium has a tarp. I didn't see that firsthand last year, but I did watch that.
Whatever was it they tried to salvage the field mid game and put the tarp on that was a that was interesting to see but shout out the Phoenix municipal grounds crew there for for trying to save it save that without trying to use the tarp that's lot of effort there, too And going on to one of your other points is blackout I don't think it really makes a difference if it's a blackout maroon monsoon or a gold game. It's more about the execution of the idea. It's can you
get 99 and 100 percent of the crowd wearing that the themed color and if you do it looks great and then with that said players feel oh you fans brought in the work we're gonna play your heart out for you too which does matter to an extent but
Yeah, whether it's black, gold, white, it's hockey does white, which is starting up soon, I want to mention. It's going to be four days until puck drop at Bullard Arena.
Tom Hardon (47:54)
Five days, ⁓ four days when this episode goes up.
Andrew Hayslett (47:57)
Yeah, for when it goes out math is hard for us journalists But yeah, whatever the color is whatever the sport it is. It's can can you execute? Simple as that
Tom Hardon (48:12)
I for one, I love the touch of putting out the towels in the student section, even if it did evoke a little bit of Pittsburgh Steelers terrible towels. I think that it was a perfect touch by the 942 crew getting those towels out and getting the whole student section bought in. I loved seeing the crowd stay mostly full throughout the entire game. It's something that we've been lacking for quite a while and I think the fan engagement is
100 % on the rise and if this team keeps keeps playing to to the level that they have been and even getting better to where they should be, it's only going to go higher from there. This this will be a must have ticket for for any Valley sports fan. You'll want to be at some of the stadium, not in America field, not America Stadium, whatever the proper name of it is. You'll want to be there on on Saturdays or on Friday for the territory.
territorial cup game.
Austen Bundy (49:13)
Shout out to 942 Crew 2. mean, they do a lot of good work. I remember I was a part of it when I was a student there and Bill Kennedy and those guys, they really have a tight ship and they do a lot of good work for the students. I hope the students still appreciate everything that they're doing because the ASU student section would be nothing without them. I mean, without their spirit, without all the effort that they put into it.
Andrew Hayslett (49:36)
I know Bill's still there. I see him at games. I go, there he is. He's still got it.
Tom Hardon (49:47)
Well, that'll wrap up another episode of Echo from the Buttes. Even though we have a bye week next week, we will still be on the air for our Friday show. We will be giving a preview of ASU hockey starting the season against Penn State. We'll also take a look at men's and women's basketball with their schedule leases and touch on a little bit of season preview there. And we'll recap some of the other ASU athletics going on with volleyball and anybody else that is.
that is in action. So for Andrew Hazlitt and Austin Bundy, I'm Tom Harden. Thank you again for listening and as always, Forks Up and Go Devils!